CitySpire (also known as CitySpire Center) is a mixed-use
skyscraper
A skyscraper is a tall continuously habitable building having multiple floors. Modern sources currently define skyscrapers as being at least or in height, though there is no universally accepted definition. Skyscrapers are very tall high-ris ...
Midtown Manhattan
Midtown Manhattan is the central portion of the New York City borough of Manhattan and serves as the city's primary central business district. Midtown is home to some of the city's most prominent buildings, including the Empire State Buildin ...
neighborhood of
New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
. Completed in 1990 and designed by
Murphy/Jahn
Helmut Jahn (January 4, 1940 – May 8, 2021) was a German-American architect, known for projects such as the Sony Center on Potsdamer Platz in Berlin, Germany; the Messeturm in Frankfurt, Germany; the Thompson Center in Chicago; One Liberty ...
Architects, the building measures tall with 75 stories. CitySpire was developed by Ian Bruce Eichner on a site adjacent to the New York City Center theater. When completed, CitySpire was the second-tallest concrete tower in the United States after the Sears Tower.
The skyscraper has an octagonal plan with a dome inspired by that of the New York City Center. The facade is made of stone with glass windows, and it contains setbacks at the 46th and 62nd floors. The building has entrances at 56th and 55th Streets, connected by a passageway that forms part of
6½ Avenue
__NOTOC__
6½ Avenue is a north-south Pedestrian malls in the United States, pedestrian passageway in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, running from 51st Street (Manhattan), West 51st to 57th Street (Manhattan), West 57th Streets between Sixth ...
. The lowest 22 floors of the tower are for commercial use. Above are luxury apartments, which are larger on higher floors.
Eichner proposed CitySpire in 1984, acquiring unused air rights above City Center and making improvements to the theater to almost double the tower's area. After several agencies approved the project, City Center began construction in 1985 and was
topped out
In building construction, topping out (sometimes referred to as topping off) is a builders' rite traditionally held when the last beam (or its equivalent) is placed atop a structure during its construction. Nowadays, the ceremony is often parlaye ...
by June 1987. A controversy ensued when the building exceeded its approved height by ; Eichner agreed to add dance-studio space to compensate for the height overrun, but he ultimately never built the space. Soon after CitySpire's opening in 1989, the building went into foreclosure, and there were complaints of a whistling noise from the roof for two years.
Sixth Avenue
Sixth Avenue – also known as Avenue of the Americas, although this name is seldom used by New Yorkers, p.24 – is a major thoroughfare in New York City's borough of Manhattan, on which traffic runs northbound, or "uptown". It is commercial ...
Central Park
Central Park is an urban park in New York City located between the Upper West Side, Upper West and Upper East Sides of Manhattan. It is the List of New York City parks, fifth-largest park in the city, covering . It is the most visited urban par ...
, in the
Midtown Manhattan
Midtown Manhattan is the central portion of the New York City borough of Manhattan and serves as the city's primary central business district. Midtown is home to some of the city's most prominent buildings, including the Empire State Buildin ...
neighborhood of
New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
. The building's
land lot
In real estate, a lot or plot is a tract or parcel of land owned or meant to be owned by some owner(s). A plot is essentially considered a parcel of real property in some countries or immovable property (meaning practically the same thing) in ...
covers and has a
frontage
Frontage is the boundary between a plot of land or a building and the road onto which the plot or building fronts. Frontage may also refer to the full length of this boundary. This length is considered especially important for certain types of ...
of along 56th Street. While the site is deep, extending south to 55th Street, only a small section of the lot has frontage on 55th Street.
The building is directly west of the New York City Center and
125 West 55th Street
125 West 55th Street, also known as Avenue of the Americas Plaza, is a 23-story, office building located on 55th Street between the Avenue of the Americas (Sixth Avenue) and Seventh Avenue in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. The building al ...
; the former is a
New York City designated landmark
The New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC) is the New York City agency charged with administering the city's Landmarks Preservation Law. The LPC is responsible for protecting New York City's architecturally, historically, and cu ...
at 135 West 55th Street. Immediately to the north are
Carnegie Hall
Carnegie Hall ( ) is a concert venue in Midtown Manhattan in New York City. It is at 881 Seventh Avenue (Manhattan), Seventh Avenue, occupying the east side of Seventh Avenue between West 56th Street (Manhattan), 56th and 57th Street (Manhatta ...
,
Carnegie Hall Tower
Carnegie Hall Tower is a skyscraper at 152 West 57th Street in the Midtown Manhattan neighborhood of New York City. Completed in 1990 and designed by César Pelli, the building measures tall with 60 stories. Due to the presence of Carneg ...
,
Russian Tea Room
The Russian Tea Room is an Art Deco Russo-Continental restaurant, located at 150 West 57th Street (between Sixth Avenue and Seventh Avenue), between Carnegie Hall Tower and Metropolitan Tower, in the New York City borough of Manhattan.
...
, and Metropolitan Tower from west to east. Other nearby buildings include
140 West 57th Street
140 West 57th Street, also known as The Beaufort, is an office building on 57th Street between Sixth Avenue and Seventh Avenue in Midtown Manhattan in New York City. It was built from 1907 to 1909 and designed by Pollard and Steinam, who al ...
,
130 West 57th Street
130 West 57th Street is an office building on 57th Street between Sixth Avenue and Seventh Avenue in Midtown Manhattan in New York City. It was built from 1907 to 1908 and designed by Pollard and Steinam, who also simultaneously designed the ...
, and the
Parker New York
The Thompson Central Park New York is a 587-room hotel located at 56th Street in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. Located near Central Park, the 42-story hotel building houses restaurants, a gym, and other retailers.
History
The hotel opene ...
hotel to the northeast, as well as the
55th Street Playhouse
The 55th Street Playhouse—periodically referred to as the 55th Street Cinema and Europa Theatre—was a 253-seat movie house at 154 West 55th Street, Midtown Manhattan, New York City, that opened on May 20, 1927. Many classic art and foreign ...
to the southwest and
1345 Avenue of the Americas
1345 Avenue of the Americas, also known as the Building, is a -tall, 50-story skyscraper in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. Located on Sixth Avenue between 54th and 55th Streets, the building was built by Fisher Brothers and designed by ...
to the southeast.
The neighborhood was historically part of an artistic hub that developed around the two blocks of West 57th Street from
Sixth Avenue
Sixth Avenue – also known as Avenue of the Americas, although this name is seldom used by New Yorkers, p.24 – is a major thoroughfare in New York City's borough of Manhattan, on which traffic runs northbound, or "uptown". It is commercial ...
west to Broadway during the late 19th and early 20th centuries, following the opening of Carnegie Hall. Several buildings in the area were constructed as residences for artists and musicians, such as 130 and 140 West 57th Street, the Rodin Studios, and the Osborne Apartments, as well as the demolished Sherwood Studios and Rembrandt. In addition, the area contained the headquarters of organizations such as the American Fine Arts Society, the
Lotos Club
The Lotos Club was founded in 1870 as a gentlemen's club in New York City; it has since also admitted women as members. Its founders were primarily a young group of writers and critics. Mark Twain, an early member, called it the "Ace of Clubs". ...
, and the
American Society of Civil Engineers
American(s) may refer to:
* American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America"
** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America
** American ancestry, pe ...
. Just prior to CitySpire's construction, the site was occupied by six vacant lots at 132–158 West 56th Street and one on 137 West 55th Street. These lots were acquired in the 1970s by Richard M. Chapman, who razed the buildings there.
Architecture
CitySpire (also known as CitySpire Center) was designed by
Murphy/Jahn
Helmut Jahn (January 4, 1940 – May 8, 2021) was a German-American architect, known for projects such as the Sony Center on Potsdamer Platz in Berlin, Germany; the Messeturm in Frankfurt, Germany; the Thompson Center in Chicago; One Liberty ...
Tishman Realty & Construction
Tishman Realty & Construction Co., Inc. is an American corporation founded in 1898 that owns and develops real estate. The company is known for being the contractor that built the original World Trade Center in New York City. Tishman Constructio ...
, with Robert Rosenwasser Associates as structural engineer. CitySpire is tall with 75 above-ground levels and two basement stories; the concrete frame reaches a height of . When completed, CitySpire was the second-tallest concrete tower in the United States after the Sears Tower in
Chicago
(''City in a Garden''); I Will
, image_map =
, map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago
, coordinates =
, coordinates_footnotes =
, subdivision_type = Country
, subdivision_name ...
.
Form and facade
CitySpire was designed from the beginning as an octagonal tower with wings on the east and west. CitySpire has three setbacks on the east and west they are placed at the 23rd, 46th, and 62nd floors. Most of the building is no more than wide. Because the building is so narrow, the upper stories sometimes sway during heavy storms.
As proposed, the main shaft of the tower was to be clad in stone, while the wings were to be made of glass. The facade is made of Sardinian "luna pearl" that is cut into slabs, measuring about . Each slab is attached to the aluminum curtain wall frame on all sides, supported only by the curtain wall. The stone panels are entirely prefabricated and are insulated with
fiberglass
Fiberglass (American English) or fibreglass (Commonwealth English) is a common type of fiber-reinforced plastic using glass fiber. The fibers may be randomly arranged, flattened into a sheet called a chopped strand mat, or woven into glass cloth ...
panels measuring thick, along with
neoprene
Neoprene (also polychloroprene) is a family of synthetic rubbers that are produced by polymerization of chloroprene.Werner Obrecht, Jean-Pierre Lambert, Michael Happ, Christiane Oppenheimer-Stix, John Dunn and Ralf Krüger "Rubber, 4. Emulsion R ...
gaskets and silicone caulk. The setbacks at the 46th and 62nd floors were designed with
parapet
A parapet is a barrier that is an extension of the wall at the edge of a roof, terrace, balcony, walkway or other structure. The word comes ultimately from the Italian ''parapetto'' (''parare'' 'to cover/defend' and ''petto'' 'chest/breast'). Whe ...
s of steel and concrete, which were reduced in size as part of a 1988 lawsuit settlement concerning the building's height. Eichner disliked the parapets; he suggested that residents on the 46th floor "can look out at it and know they're looking at a wall instead of Central Park so that Helmut Jahn can rest easy knowing that his 'artistic integrity' is intact."
The roof has a copper-faced dome which, as originally proposed, was supposed to be tall. When it was ultimately installed in 1988, the dome contained eight steel ribs, each measuring long and weighing . Each rib consisted of three sections. The dome itself contains
louver
A louver (American English) or louvre (British English
British English (BrE, en-GB, or BE) is, according to Lexico, Oxford Dictionaries, "English language, English as used in Great Britain, as distinct from that used elsewhere". Mor ...
s and was designed with a green surface. When the dome was constructed, wind created a loud whistling sound when passing through the louvers; this was remedied in 1992 with the removal of alternating panels. Paul Sachner of '' Architectural Record'' initially likened the dome to that of the Nebraska State Capitol, while Paul Goldberger of ''
The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'' said the dome was meant to relate to City Center.
Structural features
The
superstructure
A superstructure is an upward extension of an existing structure above a baseline. This term is applied to various kinds of physical structures such as buildings, bridges, or ships.
Aboard ships and large boats
On water craft, the superstruct ...
is made of concrete. Because of CitySpire's mixed-use spaces, it contains nine different structural systems, since a unified grid of columns was infeasible for apartment layouts. Further, because Eichner wanted to maximize views of the surrounding city, the wind-resisting sections of the superstructure had to be placed in the interior.
The lower stories, used as offices, were largely designed as a grid of concrete columns, allowing for flexible office layouts. While the lower stories are largely composed of grids of columns, there are also sections of rectangular concrete panels, which are staggered across several levels to create a diagonal
wind brace
In architecture, wind braces are diagonal braces to tie the rafters of a roof together and prevent racking. In medieval roofs they are arched, and run from the principal rafters to catch the purlin
A purlin (or historically purline, purloyne, pur ...
. The upper stories are designed as a "shear wall/open tube" structural system, in which
shear wall
In structural engineering, a shear wall is a vertical element of a system that is designed to resist in-plane lateral forces, typically wind and seismic loads. In many jurisdictions, the International Building Code and International Residential Co ...
s extend from the elevator core at the center of the tower, connecting to the outer columns.
Interior
CitySpire has a floor area of around , and ten elevators rise the height of the building. Before CitySpire was developed, the site was
zoned
Zoning is a method of urban planning in which a municipality or other tier of government divides land into areas called zones, each of which has a set of regulations for new development that differs from other zones. Zones may be defined for a si ...
to only allow a building of around 34 stories without any modifications. Given the size of the lot, this would have provided up to of space. Eichner obtained unused air rights above City Center, which only occupied a small amount of the maximum space allowed for its lot; this allowed a 60-story tower. On top of this, Eichner was allowed to increase the building's
floor area ratio
Floor area ratio (FAR) is the ratio of a building's total floor area (gross floor area) to the size of the piece of land upon which it is built. It is often used as one of the regulations in city planning along with the building-to-land ratio. The ...
by 20 percent in exchange for renovating City Center. This amounted to of extra space. These bonuses allowed CitySpire to be more than twice as large as it ordinarily would have been.
The interior floor-numbering system skips floors 13 and 25, so there are physically only 73 stories, though the top story is numbered 75. The lowest 22 or 23 floors of the building are for commercial use. There are luxury apartments on the remaining floors, as well as a mechanical story. The building was designed with elaborate details. The attention to detail extended to the elevator buttons, which Jahn redesigned with three buttons to a row when Eichner found two buttons per row to be unpleasing.
Base
A pedestrian arcade between 56th and 55th Streets is included in CitySpire's base as part of its construction. The arcade is one of nine passageways that form
6½ Avenue
__NOTOC__
6½ Avenue is a north-south Pedestrian malls in the United States, pedestrian passageway in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, running from 51st Street (Manhattan), West 51st to 57th Street (Manhattan), West 57th Streets between Sixth ...
, a set of full-block passageways from 51st to 57th Street between Sixth and Seventh Avenues. It was built as a "through-block connection" under the Special Midtown District, created in 1982. The connection itself was not opened until 1997, several years after the building opened; the delay was largely due to the building's foreclosure and other disputes in the early 1990s. The arcade, designed by Brennan Beer Gorman, consists of marble and granite walls as well as a ceiling. The passageway is decorated in an
Art Deco
Art Deco, short for the French ''Arts Décoratifs'', and sometimes just called Deco, is a style of visual arts, architecture, and product design, that first appeared in France in the 1910s (just before World War I), and flourished in the Unite ...
-inspired style, with theater posters on the walls. The space has recessed lights on the ceiling and lights on the walls, but there is no seating since the passageway was designed merely for pedestrian movement.
The office and residential lobbies are separate from each other. The residential lobby at 150 West 56th Street has a domed ceiling as well as wooden paneling. The office portion of CitySpire has the address 156 West 56th Street. There is also a bar called Carnegie Club (originally Carnegie Bar and Books). The bar, on the ground floor, has a ceiling high with an overhanging mezzanine. A garage and cafe was also included in the base. The building was planned with of office space. Each of the office stories typically measures , with polygonal cutouts at each corner.
Tower
The building was proposed with 355 luxury residential
condominium
A condominium (or condo for short) is an ownership structure whereby a building is divided into several units that are each separately owned, surrounded by common areas that are jointly owned. The term can be applied to the building or complex ...
s, but it was completed with 339 or 340 condos. According to the
New York City Department of City Planning
The Department of City Planning (DCP) is the department of the government of New York City responsible for setting the framework of city's physical and socioeconomic planning. The department is responsible for land use and environmental review, p ...
, there are 340 condominiums in the entire building, of which 337 are residential units. About 100 of the apartments were built with one bedroom, with the rest having multiple bedrooms. Many of the residential units are separated from each other by the building's shear walls. Due to the setbacks on the exterior, floors 47 through 61 typically measure , while floors 63 through 69 are an octagon measuring 80 feet across.
The apartments at CitySpire vary in size and arrangement, though many of the units contain terraces. For instance, one studio apartment has a living room, kitchen, and terrace. Some of the one-bedroom units also have living and dining rooms with angled walls. In some of the two-bedroom units, there is a foyer with a living/dining room, kitchens, and bedrooms leading off it. There are also duplex units with kitchens, living rooms, and dining rooms on the lower tier, as well as bedrooms on the upper tiers. One of the larger duplexes, on floors 65/66, has four bedrooms; a living/dining area with a library and breakfast area; a family room; and a terrace measuring . On upper floors, the units tend to be larger, reaching below the penthouse.
Eichner originally intended to occupy a penthouse apartment atop CitySpire, but he ended up never living in the unit. The penthouse was instead purchased in 1993 by real estate developer Steven Klar for about $4.5 million as a "raw space"; it covers floors 72 through 75, though floor 72 is a guest suite. Klar had hired Juan Pablo Molyneux to redesign the penthouse over two and a half years. The penthouse, covering , has six bedrooms and nine bathrooms, as well as three terraces. The master bedroom takes up an entire story, while the master bathroom has green marble cladding as well as bronze and mahogany fixtures. The penthouse also has a classical-columned foyer, a large dining room with a chandelier, a wine closet with space for 1,000 bottles, and a private elevator. Molyneux personally disliked the design, calling it a "horror", though this was apparently because Molyneux actually never saw the design in person, having been dismissed before the design was completed.
When CitySpire was built, it was advertised with amenities such as the SpireCard, a charge account to which each resident could request a luxury service for a fee. It was also advertised with a media room containing a large-screen TV; a lounge with bar; and a business center with
stock quote
Ticker tape was the earliest electrical dedicated financial communications medium, transmitting stock price information over telegraph lines, in use from around 1870 through 1970. It consisted of a paper strip that ran through a machine called a ...
and telex machines. The modern amenities include a party and conference rooms, play area, and fitness center with pool.
History
The neighboring New York City Center had opened in 1924 as the Mecca Temple, a house of worship for the
Shriners
Shriners International, formally known as the Ancient Arabic Order of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine (AAONMS), is an American Masonic society established in 1870 and is headquartered in Tampa, Florida.
Shriners International describes itself ...
. The Mecca Temple was acquired by the New York City government in 1943 and became a theater. In 1982, City Center completed a minor renovation to the lobby and orchestra. City Center planned another set of improvements to enlarge stage, storage, and balcony areas. The
New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission
The New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC) is the New York City agency charged with administering the city's Landmarks Preservation Law. The LPC is responsible for protecting New York City's architecturally, historically, and cu ...
(LPC) designated City Center as a city landmark in 1983; as a result, the commission was required to approve any major alterations to the theater. Concurrently, Bruce Eichner bought Chapman's neighboring site for $18 million. He also bought a parking garage, whose owner agreed to sell it on the condition a replacement parking garage was built.
Development
Planning
In May 1984, Eichner announced that he would build a 72-story skyscraper on the site, designed by Murphy/Jahn. The building would contain 22 stories of offices and 49 stories of condominiums. It would be shaped like an octagon with setbacks and a domed roof. A key part of Eichner's development was his proposal to purchase unused air rights above City Center. Eichner would also make improvements to City Center to obtain additional space. The sale was expected to raise $10 to 14 million for the New York City Opera,
New York City Ballet
New York City Ballet (NYCB) is a ballet company founded in 1948 by choreographer George Balanchine and Lincoln Kirstein. Balanchine and Jerome Robbins are considered the founding choreographers of the company. Léon Barzin was the company' ...
, and City Center's sublessee 55th Street Dance Theater. The proposed air-rights sale received criticism both for its relatively low price and for the fact that it would allow an excessively large building. City Center Tower was one of several high-rise developments planned for the area at the time; Metropolitan Tower and Carnegie Hall Tower were being proposed as well.
The air-rights transfers needed the approval of several agencies. In August 1984, the New York City Board of Estimate voted to allow the sale of air rights. The LPC was scheduled to hold a hearing for the proposed sale in November 1984, but an unrelated controversy over another landmark candidate took up all the time allotted for discussing the air-rights sale. The LPC granted the project a "certificate of appropriateness" in January 1985, which allowed the LPC to apply for a special zoning permit from the New York City Planning Commission (CPC) for the air-rights transfer. Several agencies then needed to approve the tower itself. Following objections from members of the Board of Estimate and CPC, some elements of City Center Tower were downsized. The CPC approved the tower in June 1985, followed by the Board of Estimate that August.
The building had been approved to a height of about . Though the City Center Tower was to be New York City's tallest residential tower upon its construction, Eichner cited a study that "proved" the top of the tower would not cast shadows on the street. He described the tower as a "quintessential New York skyscraper", compared to the "undistinguished" glass-clad office buildings on Madison and Park Avenues. Eichner received $157.5 million in construction financing. Both Eichner and his lawyer Howard Horenstein donated several thousand dollars to Mayor Ed Koch, who had voted in favor of the tower. The donations were investigated in an ethics probe in 1987.
Construction
By the time the Board of Estimate had approved City Center Tower, pouring of the concrete slabs was underway. The project was being referred to as CitySpire by mid-1986, when
European American Bank
Citigroup Inc. or Citi (stylized as citi) is an American multinational investment bank and financial services corporation headquartered in New York City. The company was formed by the merger of banking giant Citicorp and financial conglomerat ...
leased eight of the office stories. The construction of CitySpire involved controversies over safety. Susan Guszynski of the
Joffrey Ballet
The Joffrey Ballet is one of the premier dance companies and training institutions in the world today. Located in Chicago, Illinois, the Joffrey regularly performs classical and contemporary ballets during its annual performance season at Lyric O ...
, a tenant in City Center, wrote a letter to the New York City Department of Buildings (DOB) in late 1986, alleging that three Joffrey staff had been hit by falling concrete during one week that October. The Buildings Department subsequently received four additional complaints of falling objects, including one instance in which a portion of the facade fell from the roof. Neighbors also filed lawsuits claiming that CitySpire's construction had led to debris pileups and various incidents. One neighbor claimed that he received death threats after complaining to the police about cracked windows, while another neighbor was allegedly raped after an attacker climbed into her apartment through CitySpire's scaffolding.
Marketing for the residential units started in March 1987, with TV advertisements that featured celebrities such as
Dick Cavett
Richard Alva Cavett (; born November 19, 1936) is an American television personality and former talk show host. He appeared regularly on nationally broadcast television in the United States for five decades, from the 1960s through the 2000s.
In ...
Lauren Hutton
Lauren Hutton (born Mary Laurence Hutton; November 17, 1943) is an American model and actress. Born and raised in the southern United States, Hutton relocated to New York City in her early adulthood to begin a modeling career. Though she was ini ...
, Robert Joffrey, Lynn Redgrave, and Tommy Tune. Despite this, only 60 of the 340 condos were in contract by that August. The slow sales were attributed to the shortage of small apartments, as well as the tower's location in a traditionally non-residential neighborhood. The advertisements also received complaints for including only white people; the director of the building's marketing team claimed they were just targeting the demographic who was most likely to buy apartments there. Horenstein denied the advertisements were intended to discourage minorities.
Completion and height controversy
The building had
topped out
In building construction, topping out (sometimes referred to as topping off) is a builders' rite traditionally held when the last beam (or its equivalent) is placed atop a structure during its construction. Nowadays, the ceremony is often parlaye ...
by mid-1987. The building, as constructed, exceeded its approved height by either or . The difference of was a calculation error from two different methods of measuring height, but the extra 11 feet came from Eichner's decision to add of cement to all the floor slabs to stiffen them. The topped-out structure had to undergo a second public review from the Board of Estimate,
Manhattan Community Board 5
Manhattan Community Board 5 is a New York City community board, part of the local government apparatus of the city, with the responsibility for the neighborhoods of Midtown, Times Square, most of the Theater District, the Diamond District, the ...
, and the CPC. Eichner voluntarily agreed to halt CitySpire's structural work, though he saw the height overruns as being "of no consequence to anyone". By November 1987, Eichner and city officials were discussing a compromise in which Eichner would give more arts funding but keep the extra height. By the end of 1987, Eichner had sold 164 of the apartments, and some of the commercial space was already occupied. Residential prices at CitySpire had remained relatively low in the wake of
Black Monday
Black Monday refers to specific Mondays when undesirable or turbulent events have occurred. It has been used to designate massacres, military battles, and stock market crashes.
Historic events
*1209, Dublin – when a group of 500 recently arriv ...
two months earlier.
Community Board 5 officials voted against allowing the extra height in protest of the zoning law. The CPC rejected the additional height that December, saying Eichner could have pursued other options, including lowering ceiling heights, to stay within the 800-foot height limit. CPC chairwoman Sylvia Deutsch rejected Eichner's offer to add unrelated amenities and pay the city extra cash, and she also dismissed complaints from neighbors who opposed the project for unrelated reasons. In April 1988, the city and Eichner tentatively reached a settlement in which Eichner agreed to build of dance studios above the pedestrian arcade and reduce some facade details. The agreement, contingent on the dome not being completed, had not been ratified by the CPC or Board of Estimate. Deutsch called the agreement "reasonable"; however, community groups thought it would set a precedent for developers who built past their height limits, and some LPC members specifically opposed the design.
Residents of the lower floors were allowed to move into the building by mid-1988, even though the upper stories did not have their occupancy certificate. CitySpire's dome was completed in August 1988, apparently in violation of the settlement. While Community Board 5 had notified the DOB about the illegal work earlier, the dome had been completed by the time the DOB issued a stop-work order. Koch ordered the dome dismantled that November. The ribs were partially removed so CitySpire would only exceed the permitted height by . City Center filed a lawsuit that month, alleging that Eichner had not renovated the theater as promised. City Center sought an injunction to forbid the DOB from issuing CitySpire a
certificate of occupancy
Certificate may refer to:
* Birth certificate
* Marriage certificate
* Death certificate
* Gift certificate
* Certificate of authenticity, a document or seal certifying the authenticity of something
* Certificate of deposit, or CD, a financial pro ...
for the top twenty stories until the renovations were performed. A New York Supreme Court justice declined to issue the injunction, and the city allowed Eichner to open the 51st through 63rd floors. Community Board 5 "demanded" the city deny CitySpire a special zoning permit for the extra height.
The removal of the dome was temporary pending the approval of a zoning variance through the Uniform Land Use Review Procedure, which was granted in January 1989. Soon after, the CPC voted to permit the completion of CitySpire's dome in exchange for the dance studios in the base. The Board of Estimate continued to debate over whether the dance studios were an appropriate penalty for Eichner. In March 1989, the Board of Estimate voted 6–5 to allow the dance studios as an appropriate penalty. The height agreement received opposition from city comptroller Harrison J. Goldin, who charged that Eichner was violating the law, and from critics who believed the dance studios, at , were too small. The dome was subsequently damaged in a fire in May 1989, which investigators determined was an arson. Eichner had still not completed renovations at City Center like he had promised, and the building's pedestrian arcade was not open to the public.
Usage
Eichner had sold 280 of the apartments and three-quarters of the office space by early 1989, and the building was completed by 1990. CitySpire's dance studios were supposed to be completed in September 1989, but it was not until mid-1990 that Eichner applied for a permit. Construction on the studios had not even started because, according to Hornstein, the plans had to be approved by several agencies. Eichner still had yet to sell the 50 remaining apartments and the remaining 20 percent of commercial space. Ten of these apartments were in the top stories that could not be completed until the studios were finished.
Noise pollution and bankruptcy
Shortly after CitySpire's completion, Eichner was concurrently negotiating construction loans with his lenders, which included
Citibank
Citibank, N. A. (N. A. stands for " National Association") is the primary U.S. banking subsidiary of financial services multinational Citigroup. Citibank was founded in 1812 as the City Bank of New York, and later became First National City ...
and European American Bank. He was also delinquent on $3.7 million of tax payments, which the city sued that July to recover. In October 1990, European American Bank challenged the collateral behind $50 million worth of construction loans on the building. The next month, the bank foreclosed on the loans. That December, the New York City Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) fined CitySpire for noise violations, making CitySpire the first building to be individually cited by the DEP for noise pollution. The DEP had received hundreds of complaints about a loud whistling noise that was audible several blocks away; the noise was caused by wind blowing through louvers on the dome. Neighbors reported being kept awake by the noise.
Monroe Price Monroe Edwin Price (born 1938) was director of the University of Pennsylvania's Center for Global Communication Studies (CGCS) at the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania and director of the Stanhope Centre for Commun ...
opined that "the community should attempt to understand what the building is trying to say", while '' Progressive Architecture'' said: "In a less restrictive era, we might look forward to developers' plans for 'The Wind Chime Centre' or 'One Kazoo Plaza'."
At a hearing in February 1991, Judge Gerald Denaro of New York City's Environmental Control Board ordered a study on the noise coming from the dome. The building faced a fine of up to $880 if it was found guilty of whistling. West 56th Street Association, the building's legal owner, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection at the end of that month. The association, a
limited partnership
A limited partnership (LP) is a form of partnership similar to a general partnership except that while a general partnership must have at least two general partners (GPs), a limited partnership must have at least one GP and at least one limited ...
where Eichner was the
general partner General partner is a person who joins with at least one other person to form a business. A general partner has responsibility for the actions of the business, can legally bind the business and is personally liable for all the partnership's debts an ...
, faced lawsuits from both European American Bank and Bank of Nova Scotia. The association had also faced a
receivership
In law, receivership is a situation in which an institution or enterprise is held by a receiver—a person "placed in the custodial responsibility for the property of others, including tangible and intangible assets and rights"—especially in ca ...
proceeding, as it had also failed to pay the condominium apartments' common charges. The bankruptcy proceeding absolved Eichner from paying $11 million in unpaid taxes, but the building's residential sales office had to shut down that year.
In April 1991, Denaro ruled that CitySpire was guilty of violating the noise ordinance and fined the managing agent $220. A federal judge ruled that September that the city's noise code was too vague to be enforced, leading the
New York City Council
The New York City Council is the lawmaking body of New York City. It has 51 members from 51 council districts throughout the five Borough (New York City), boroughs.
The council serves as a check against the Mayor of New York City, mayor in a may ...
to draft a law to more strictly define noise. By May 1992, the building's board of managers said the whistling would be fixed within several weeks. Bankruptcy proceedings, meanwhile, had been stalled over an unpaid $324,000 capital gains tax. A reorganization plan for the tower was finally approved in September 1992, eighteen months after the building's owner had filed for bankruptcy. The roof noise was stopped that October, and the receivers paid the city $2.1 million instead of renovating City Center's studios as a penalty. The receivers also sought to be exempted from their obligation to build studios above the pedestrian arcade, which was still unfinished.
Late 1990s to present
Euram, a subsidiary of European American Bank's parent
ABN AMRO
ABN or abn may refer to:
Companies
* ABN AMRO Group, a Dutch bank group
* ABN AMRO, sometimes referred to as "ABN" in shorthand, is a Dutch state-owned bank
* Algemene Bank Nederland, a now-defunct Dutch bank
Radio, news and television organizat ...
, took over the residential section and renovated 75 vacant units. The Bank of Nova Scotia rebranded the commercial section as Midland Tower. Euram started marketing the vacant apartments in May 1993; ten of the units had been sold within a month, and all the condos were sold by the following year. Eichner continued to maintain offices at CitySpire. Although the financial issues and noise complaints had been resolved, the studios and arcade, which had been a compromise for CitySpire's height, had still not been completed by 1995. The arcade was strewn with litter and blocked off with razor wire and wooden panels, and CitySpire's owners planned to renovate it for use. The owners planned to scrap the studios above the arcade, instead creating additional rehearsal space in City Center itself.
Around 1996, Joseph Neumann and Credit Suisse First Boston acquired CitySpire for $38 million. The building had been offered for $50 million, but Neumann and First Boston were able to buy the building for less after beating a competing bid from Henry Elghanayan. At the time, the building owed $1.9 million in taxes to the city government. The office owners (composed of First Boston and external investors), along with the residential condo owners, bore the cost of the pedestrian arcade's $1 million renovation. CitySpire's pedestrian arcade was finally completed in late 1997. Upon the arcade's completion,
David W. Dunlap
David W. Dunlap (born 1952) is an American journalist who worked as a reporter for ''The New York Times''. He wrote a regular column, Building Blocks, that looked at the New York metropolitan area through its architecture, infrastructure, spaces, a ...
wrote for ''The New York Times'' that it had taken seven years between the authorization of the
first transcontinental railroad
North America's first transcontinental railroad (known originally as the "Pacific Railroad" and later as the " Overland Route") was a continuous railroad line constructed between 1863 and 1869 that connected the existing eastern U.S. rail netwo ...
and the laying of its golden spike, but it had taken twelve years between the arcade's approval and its opening. The arcade's opening completed the set of walkways from 51st to 57th Street. In addition, some of the office space was converted into "prebuilt" offices.
The office stories were owned by Singapore government investment fund GIC by 2001. GIC leased space to Windels Marx, GE Capital, and
The Recording Academy
The Recording Academy (formally the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences; abbreviated NARAS) is an American learned academy of musicians, producers, recording engineers, and other musical professionals. It is famous for its Grammy Aw ...
. That year,
Lehman Brothers
Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. ( ) was an American global financial services firm founded in 1847. Before Bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers, filing for bankruptcy in 2008, Lehman was the fourth-largest investment bank in the United States (behind Gol ...
and
Morgan Stanley
Morgan Stanley is an American multinational investment management and financial services company headquartered at 1585 Broadway in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. With offices in more than 41 countries and more than 75,000 employees, the fir ...
provided a $900 million mortgage to GIC for CitySpire's office stories and some of GIC's other properties. The office section of CitySpire was acquired in 2004 by Tishman Speyer, who bought a 51 percent majority stake. GIC continued to hold a 49 percent stake.
In 2012, Tishman Speyer and an unidentified pension fund acquired CitySpire and several other buildings as part of a portfolio valued at $1.6 billion. The same year,
Douglas Elliman
Douglas Elliman is an American real estate company.
Douglas Elliman employs more than 7,000 agents and has 113 offices in New York City and across the country. The company also has a number of subsidiaries related to real estate services such as ...
marketed the penthouse apartment for $100 million, which would have made it the most expensive residence in New York City had it been sold at that price. After receiving few offers, the penthouse's owner withdrew the unit from the market and offered it for sale himself, only to withdraw it again in 2015. At that point, the majority of CitySpire's residences, over sixty percent, were being used as pieds-a-terre rather than as primary residences. , CitySpire's commercial occupants include New York Road Runners, Windels Marx, and
Brown Shoe Company
Caleres Inc. is an American footwear company that owns and operates a variety of footwear brands. Its headquarters is located in Clayton, Missouri, a suburb of St. Louis. Harry Berkowitz of ''Newsday'' described the project as one of several designed by architects who "want little to do with the idea of adjusting to a neighborhood". Paul M. Sachner wrote for ''Architectural Record'' that the plans "exemplify the 'high-tech historicist' quality" of Murphy/Jahn's work, but he said "many question the appropriateness of a 70-story building" on such a narrow site. By the time CitySpire was completed, Goldberger believed it looked weaker than the neighboring Carnegie Hall and Metropolitan towers, even though CitySpire had looked better in conceptual depictions.
CitySpire's construction also prompted discussion on the appropriateness of transferring air rights from city landmarks, such as City Center, to raise money for landmarks' upkeep.New York Landmarks Conservancy executive director
Laurie Beckelman
Laurie may refer to:
Places
* Laurie, Cantal, France, a commune
* Laurie, Missouri, United States, a village
* Laurie Island, Antarctica
Music
* Laurie Records, a record label
* ''Laurie'' (EP), a 1992 album by Daniel Johnston
* "Laurie (Stran ...
said that "we save ity landmarksby putting them out of context" in allowing the transfers, and Community Board 5 district manager Joan E. Ramer said that "selling off a precious city resource without understanding the ramifications is simply irresponsible". Former city planning commissioner Martin Gallent said the zoning exceptions allowed midtown Manhattan to be more "overly dense" than it already was. After the height compromise in 1988, Goldberger said, "What is to prevent another developer from adding 22 feet to his building and offering to build two dance studios?" Goldberger also referred to CitySpire as a "case of the city selling its birthright for a mess of pottage".
See also
*
List of tallest buildings in New York City
New York City, the most populous city in the United States, is home to over 7,000 completed high-rise buildings of at least , of which at least 95 are taller than . The tallest building in New York is One World Trade Center, which rises ...